Our Beautiful Tomorrow
by The Croc Shop
Summary: AU. When Metro City needs a hero, Roxanne Ritchi answers the call.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to _Megamind_. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction. A large portion, though not all, of the dialogue in this chapter was taken directly from the film and so must be properly attributed to the credited screenwriters, Alan J. Schoolcraft and Brent Simons, with consideration made to possible improvisations by Tina Fey and Will Ferrell. Their work is not my own and I've no intention or desire to claim otherwise.

Notes: So, here's a thought: what if Megamind had accidentally infused Roxanne with Metro Man's "godlike powers" instead of Hal? Let's find out! **Our Beautiful Tomorrow** is a work in progress, which means it is currently incomplete. I'll do my best to update on a regular schedule. :)

Many heartfelt thanks are owed Rawles, who read this chapter through, provided some needed criticism and encouragement, and helped correct a number of very basic issues. I also wish to tip my hat to Diana (riddering on LJ) for first suggesting this premise to me, and to recognize Molly (fairest1 on LJ) who has her own Roxanne Ritchi: Superhero story to tell.

And thank _you_ for reading!

* * *

**Our Beautiful Tomorrow**  
Chapter One.

* * *

Roxanne pulled up to the front of the power plant and threw the van into park. The building rose before her: walls of brick, decorated with old graffiti and the ever-changing turf lines of Metro City's gangs; the great, ash-blackened metal works curved like the back of some monstrous, dead beast; the stacks towering above it all; and there, the ramshackle hump of the false observatory.

"Hal, can you believe it!"

She pushed the door open and stepped out, light on her feet, light as _air_. Right here, right here, she'd found it. She'd found Megamind's lair. Roxanne laughed.

"Hal," she said, turning back to smile, "we found it! We found his lair!"

Hal remained in the passenger's seat. "Yeah, I know, it's awesome, and I am, like, so excited to be here. But why don't we call the police and have them come here, and go get some lunch together?"

Roxanne fished for her cell-phone in her bag. "The police are terrified of Megamind," she said. "If we called them, they'd set up a protective perimeter around the lair and we'd lose our chance to find out what we need to know to stop him."

"Oh, I mean, I'm not scared," Hal said. "If Megamind shows his face, I'm going to go all Ultimate Street Fighter on him."

"Get your camera," she said, motioning.

She flipped her cell open and scrolled through her contacts. Hal carried on talking, the familiar cadences and nervous bragging filling the spaces in the van like white noise. Roxanne highlighted _Whitman, Bernard_. She hesitated one moment; they'd only really spoken the once that night of the museum's destruction. But, she thought.

Roxanne stepped back from the van, slammed the door shut, and hit call. The line fuzzed, then cleared, and the automated dialing beeped in her ear. Hal closed his own door and took up a position at her back, hiding behind her with his camera up over his shoulder.

Staring up at the power plant, at Megamind's lair, Roxanne smiled again and felt as if she'd never stop.

The line clicked, and a man said, hesitant, "Ollo?" then, after a beat, "Hello?"

"Bernard, it's Roxanne," she said. She gestured for Hal to step back a bit so as to take a more comprehensive shot of the exterior. "I just want to thank you for inspiring me the other day."

"Oh!" Bernard said. The line crackled; his voice deepened. Roxanne cupped her phone, pressing it nearer to her cheek. "You inspired me, too."

She tamped her excitement down, boxing it. The thought of Bernard in his glasses and his thick suit jacket, the surprise lighting his face when she told him, nearly brought her to laughter again.

"Great!" she said. She pumped her fist. "It's time we stand up to Megamind and show him he can't push us around."

"Oh, really?" he asked.

"I'm already hot on his trail."

"Uh-huh," he said. She imagined him pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "And what gives you that idea?"

The laugh hummed in her throat. "I just found his secret hideout," she said, giddy.

The line erupted in her ear, the connection spilling over with sudden, violent static.

"Bernard?" she asked.

Another moment, then Bernard said, "Uh, how did you find his secret hideout?"

And she couldn't believe she'd never thought of it before, it was so _obvious_—

She laughed. "This is the only building in Metro City with a fake observatory on the roof!"

Bernard went quiet again. Roxanne twirled her hand, signaling Hal to bring the camera around again. He flashed a thumbs-up, still zooming in on the observatory. She glanced across the wall before her, then to the ground, and oh, leave it to Megamind.

"There's a doormat here that says _secret entrance_," she said.

Call the police, Hal had said. Ha! Roxanne tucked her phone against her shoulder and pushed forward, her hand to the wall. The bricks shimmered, then blued, and they warped around her, opening to reveal a long, dark antechamber. A set of doors marked the wall further down.

The phone warbled at her shoulder, Bernard's voice rising in strident tones. She fitted the phone to her ear again. "What?"

"What?" Bernard asked. "Oh, no, not you, Roxanne. I'm just yelling at my mother's ... urn. Don't do anything! I'll be right there."

"Well, hurry up," she said, "I'm not waiting to be found out by his brainbots." She closed her phone and stuffed it in her jacket.

The reality of it struck her then, dizzying and vast. For years she'd looked for Megamind's lair; she'd checked and rechecked the warehouses on the wharf and the row of shuttered factories in downtown. Now here she was, crossing the floor to the doors that would open onto what? A trap? An abandoned and gutted plant, used and discarded as he moved on to another lair?

"You won't find out if you don't try," she told herself.

Roxanne set her hands on the door and pushed. It creaked as it swung, the hinges long rusted. Where the hall before held shadows and dim light filtered through old and dirtied windows, the chamber she entered glimmered with sunlight, suffused through yellowed windows high above. Monitors, strange metal workings, half-assembled creations and cluttered workspaces, a clean path cutting through it all: he was still here.

She crept forward, quiet on her toes. The enormity of it swallowed her. How long had he hidden all this here? To be here, and to be here alone—

"Roxanne!"

Roxanne spun around, hefting her camera high to strike.

Bernard, bushy-haired and wide-eyed, fell back, his hands up between them, and Roxanne let her breath out in a heavy gust. He smiled, his eyes crinkling, his cheeks folding.

"Oh, I'm glad you're here," she said, smiling back at him. Her smile fell. "Wait, how did you get here so fast?"

He fumbled with his hands. "Well, uh, I happened to be speedwalking nearby when you called," and he demonstrated, arms high. He pursed his lips.

Roxanne pressed close, cutting in at his elbow. He'd a faint line of sweat along his brow, his ear, the curve of his neck.

"In a suit?" she asked. She checked around for a flash of movement or the electric gleam of a brainbot, spying.

"Uh-huh," Bernard said, keeping pace beside her. "It's called formal speedwalking. But that's not important." He stepped before her, advancing. The sunlight caught in his hair, shining gold.

Roxanne leaned to the side, arrested by the suggestion of bulk beneath a great shower of canvas; a black joint peeked out behind it, an enormous ball-joint high above her head, like an elbow, crooked.

Bernard turned to her and gestured. "This way looks exciting." His smile flashed again, bright and sweet, and she looked, following his arms to the door and the glowing sign above it.

Was everyone she knew a coward?

"It says exit," she said, exasperated.

She looked about again, checking that covered monstrosity, then the fall of the light from the window far above and a deep scarlet gleam caught her eye. A thick red curtain divided the chamber; it fluttered.

"Which is the abbreviation for exciting, right?" Bernard asked, following her as she stepped forward.

A seam split the curtain; two lengths, brought together. Roxanne ripped them apart. The rings jangled like bells and Bernard cried out. Light spilled over her.

"This is the mother load!" she said through her teeth. She threw her arms wide, taking it in.

A vast wall of notes hanging from the ceiling shivered before her; a series of blackboards and posters showed between the maze of fluttering papers. Colors glimmered; notations flashed. The whole of it covered the far wall, suggestive — evident — of a plan far greater than she had expected. Roxanne smiled.

"Wow," she breathed. Bernard echoed her, trailing behind. "Just look at this thing." She turned to him. "You know, I could really use your help in deciphering all this."

"Really!" Bernard said. He rounded his eyes and clapped a hand to his chin, nodding.

Roxanne threw him an amused look. "You're an expert on all things Megamind, right?"

"Yes, _right_," he said.

"Together, we could figure out his plan and stop it." She took one last long look at the vastness of Megamind's plan, then turned to Bernard and said, "Are you in?"

"Oh," he said, "what fun!"

Something sweet and warm popped in her chest.

"That's what I want to hear!" she said as Bernard smiled at her, his blond hair puffed like a dandelion, bristling. His eyes shone, very green.

Roxanne turned from him. She busied herself with her camera, activating the zoom. Bernard shifted, looking behind them; the scrape of his heel on the floor resounded in her ear, reverberated in her chest. A breeze stirred the paper mobiles, sending them into half-turns. Roxanne hefted her camera and began snapping.

Bernard murmured something, his voice low. Roxanne snapped another shot, then an electric hum rose, a panel in the pipework popped open, and out of the shadows, the brainbots spilled. Their long jointed tendrils dripped, whipping as they veered down. Roxanne dove, landing hard on her shoulder. The blow jolted her, but she gritted her teeth and rolled up again.

Bernard cried out, but the brainbots, driving past Roxanne, overwhelmed him.

"Bernard!" she shouted. She felt for her camera, thrown from her.

The brainbots cascaded, carrying him off in their heaving, roiling hulk. A shelving unit fell, booming against the cement floor.

"Bernard!" she called again. A weapon, she needed— She needed something—

Roxanne snatched her camera up and started after them. A deep, resin glow caught her eye: a gun, tossed free of the unit that had fallen. She scooped it up, catching the long and shining barrel in her hand, and drove forward into the shadows.

She heard Bernard, his voice muffled, his cry inarticulate and lost. His name swelled in her throat; she swallowed it. If she gave away her position, they'd both be lost. She certainly couldn't count on anyone else to help them. Roxanne pressed her back to a stack of crates and listened for the resonant thrumming of the brainbots.

There.

Roxanne ran past the towering crates and rounded the corner, the gun heavy at her thigh. Megamind knelt before her, his cape thrown over his head. She gasped and recoiled a half-step before the thought of Bernard, helpless and sweet, burst again over her.

"Megamind!" She tightened her grip on the gun and bore down on him. "What have you done with Bernard?"

He struggled upright, the scattered brainbots swirling about him in tightening circles. His cape trembled down his back. His eyes flickered.

"Bernard?" he said. He brushed at his skinsuit. "Oh, yes. I'm doing horrible things to that man. I don't want to get into it, but lasers, spikes—"

Megamind sidled over to a set of doors set an angle toward the floor. He dragged one of them up and from below Bernard cried, "Oh, please, no! Not the lasers and the spikes!"

Megamind leaned back, half-laughing. "You know the drill."

Below, Bernard wailed, "Oh, no, not the drill!"

Her breath caught in her throat. A brainbot passed her, its tentacles skimming her shoulder. It was her fault that Megamind had taken Bernard. If she had come alone—

Roxanne set her jaw. "Let him go, or—" She dragged the gun up, catching it again.

Megamind smirked up at her over the door, his mouth twisting, his brow a sneering curl. "Or what?" he said, then he spotted the gun. Horror bloomed on his face.

She flexed her grip on the handle. "I'm going to find out what this weird-looking gun does."

"No!" He threw his hands out, placating. "No! Don't," he said, enunciating carefully, "shoot that gun." He moved toward the doors again. She sighted him, following his steps. "I'll just go get him."

Megamind threw the doors open and leapt down. Roxanne took an abortive step forward, then Bernard rose between the doors, Megamind's hand gloved and dark at his throat. "His strength, it's too much," Bernard gasped out, then Megamind dragged him down again.

Roxanne steadied the gun and approached the set of doors. She didn't want to shoot Bernard, God, no, but if it was a trick, if Megamind meant to surprise her and strip the gun from her, then—

She reached out.

The doors trembled beneath her fingers and parted, and Bernard flew through them, launched into the near wall. Roxanne stumbled back, catching the gun against her chest. Her heart stammered once, then she took a breath and knelt before Bernard, crumpled against the wall. His lashes fluttered, fair on his cheeks.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

Bernard ticked his glasses up the bridge of his nose. He looked up at her through his lashes. "I did my best," he said, and he turned his face away, "but he's too fantastic."

Roxanne huffed a laugh. Every guy she knew: a nerd. She smiled and straightened, pressing up from her knees.

Bernard followed. His chest worked and exertion colored his face, but he held his hands out and said, "Here, let me carry that heavy gun for you."

Every guy: a macho nerd. She doubted he'd even know how to point it.

"I got us covered," she said. Roxanne slipped close to the wall and followed it back as she'd come.

Her footsteps echoed softly in the hallway formed by the crates, and her heart sounded as thunder in her ears. She took another slow breath to settle it. Her shoulder ached where she'd struck it. First thing she was doing when she got home was taking a hot bath.

Megamind leapt at her then, a sudden flash of blue in her peripheral vision. Roxanne turned, bringing the gun to bear on him, but he slammed into her, pushing it flat across her chest.

"Let go, it's mine!" he snarled, grappling with her.

"Bernard, run!" she shouted over her shoulder.

Megamind dragged at the gun. A muscle in her shoulder spasmed, drawn too tight. Roxanne gritted her teeth and fought through it. She kicked at Megamind's feet and hauled on the gun, pulling it back to her. It thumped off her arm, the needled tip pointing to the ground.

"You're going to break it!" Megamind snapped at her, then his finger touched the trigger and the gun jolted in her arms. A gold bolt shot at the cement, rebounded and nearly caught Megamind by the ear, and struck off a monitor. A waterfall of sparks exploded over them, white and brilliant as they showered upon Roxanne and Megamind.

"No, no, no!" Megamind said, clutching at his head. He turned around and around, his cape shimmering as it spun out behind him.

Something rang overhead, the bolt still loosed and on its chaotic path, then Roxanne felt a sudden sting in her strained shoulder, as if someone had crept up behind her and punched her, hard so the muscle clenched and the bone thrummed. She cradled the emptied and darkened gun to her chest.

"Where is it?" Megamind shouted. Another monitor blew out, throwing out sparks in a shimmering, smoking cloud. "Where _is_ it? Minion!"

Her shoulder had numbed, a dull ache welling down her arm. Roxanne took a step back, then another. Clutching the gun tight in her shaking fingers, she ran.

"It's ricocheted, sir!" Minion called behind her. "But with this interference, I don't know how we're supposed to— Sir!"

The exit sign shone, the green letters a beacon cutting through the shadows and the adrenaline thick in her blood. She grabbed at the door and someone grabbed at her. Roxanne swung the gun out as a club, and Bernard jumped away, shouting, "It's me, it's me, don't shoot!"

"Bernard!" Sweat beaded in her bra, slick beneath her breasts. "We need to get out of here, Megamind's done something—"

"This way," Bernard said. He caught her hand and tugged her away from the exit, down another long, dark passage. The deep hum of the brainbots filled the air, their electrical song nearing as they swooped from the rafters.

Roxanne weighed the gun in her hand, then she turned and lobbed it at the nearest brainbot. The gun exploded in a shower of glass and metal. The brainbot reeled back, writhing. She turned away from the lashing tentacles and spotted dynamite, stacked in a neat pile on a nearby crate.

"What are you doing?" Bernard asked.

Roxanne snapped up a pack of dynamite. A brainbot dropped before them and Roxanne grabbed at its tendrils, jerking so the metal sparked. The fuse lit.

"This'll stop them," she said, then she fumbled the dynamite, her numbing fingers clumsy. It fell and rolled behind them.

Bernard looked over his shoulder. "Did you just drop the lit dynamite!" he shouted.

"Yes!" she said. "Just keep running!"

Her toes slapped the cement. Bernard made a wailing sound, scraped harsh through his throat. Her shoulder throbbed, her back too, and the brainbots' screaming rose like a hellish choir.

In the moment before the dynamite exploded, Roxanne laughed. Then the explosion rocked them. A gust of violent heat licked at her nape. Bernard said, "There!" and they burst through the doors at the end of the hall, and the fire roiled out with them.

Roxanne curled and rolled in the dirt. A spasm tore through her. Heat flashed in her chest, like and unlike the fire in the plant. Bernard coughed beside her. Groaning, he sat up.

"Roxanne," he said. "Roxanne!"

He touched her shoulder and she pulled away, her arm twinging where his fingers brushed her. "That was exciting," she said, forcing a smile, "you were very strong," and Bernard said, "You're hurt!"

She rose to her hands and knees, then slowly to her feet. "Yeah. When that gun went off, whatever was inside it ricocheted and I think it—" She rolled her lips against the rush of needles in her shoulder. "I think it hit me."

"What?" Bernard asked. "Then we need, we need to go back inside— Megamind has to—"

"If I still had that _gun_," she said, "we could figure out what it was for."

Bernard leaned around her, his hands fluttering at her back. "I'm sure he still has the plans for it, if we just went back and asked nicely?"

"No," Roxanne said. She turned to face him. "Whatever that gun fired, he wanted it for something. We're not going back in there and giving him what he wants."

Bernard searched her face, his brow knitting. "But you're hurt. What if it's a-a virus?"

"Biological villainy isn't Megamind's style," she said. She straightened her shoulders, grimacing.

"Right, yes, I know," Bernard said. "Of course I know. But still, if you're hurt—"

She smiled at him. "Look, I know some people at Metro Mercy. I promise I'll go there first thing, as soon as I back-up my photos." She shook her camera, a bit battered but still good.

"Well, you aren't bleeding," he said, then doubtfully he asked, "But are you certain?"

Roxanne exhaled. Her wrist trembled, hot in a distant sort of way. "The important thing is to get this information out of here," she said, "and figure out what he's planning."

Bernard frowned. "You're important, too."

The sun beat down on her neck.

"You, too," she said, and she smiled again through the ache and the heat and the shivering rising inside her. "Partner."

Bernard's face smoothed. His eyes widened, green and huge. "Partner," he said.

Then Hal stumbled around the corner and said, "Hey!" She flashed Bernard a rueful look and threw her shoulders back. A muscle twinged, hot in her neck.

Roxanne set the pain aside.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to _Megamind_. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction.

Thanks are once more due Rawles for her work as betareader and for her patience as I tore at my clothing in despair. This chapter would be a wreck without her and I owe her a great deal for so willingly going through this.

Thanks as well to everyone who read the first chapter, to everyone who commented or added this to their favorites or their alerts. I hope I won't disappoint you. :)

* * *

**Our Beautiful Tomorrow**  
Chapter Two.

* * *

Roxanne folded her hands and rested them in her lap. The wall clock ticked steadily on. Stripped to her undershirt, nevertheless she perspired. A faint layer of sweat glimmered inside her wrists.

At the door: a knock. Roxanne straightened. She unclasped her hands, wiping them on her knees.

Doctor Tham Nghiem ducked into the room, fresh chart in hand. She smiled abstractly and took the swiveling chair across from the bed.

"So," Roxanne said. "Is it good news or bad news, or more of a mixed bag?"

Nghiem pushed off, riding the chair to Roxanne's side. She flipped the chart open and touched a corner of her glasses. Roxanne shifted just so, crossing her legs so that she might lean over and eye the report upside down.

"I won't have a full report from the lab until tomorrow at the very earliest, you understand," Nghiem said. "But from these preliminary results, I honestly can't say why you would need to see me."

She turned the chart over to show Roxanne, who leaned quickly away.

"See, here? Your metabolic panel is remarkable, and it looks as if that mild anemia, you remember? That's cleared." Nghiem shrugged. "Frankly you're in much better health than you were when I saw you a few months ago. I can ask the lab to run a few more tests if you like, but I expect your comprehensive and lipid panels will come back as good as these."

Roxanne worried at her shoulder, ghosting her fingers across the top of the shoulder blade. "What about my shoulder?"

Nghiem closed the chart. She half-rose, touching her thumb to the sore spot. Roxanne flinched, but it hardly hurt.

"An insect bite, non-toxic. See? It's already going down."

Nghiem sank onto her chair. She slipped a pen out of her breast pocket and clicked it.

"You've pulled the muscle, but it's only a mild strain. Use a cool compress on it tonight and if it hurts again, and take care not to overwork your arm for the next few days. You are running a low fever, but this is as much from the strain and the excitement as anything else. Aside from this?" She shrugged. "You're fine."

Roxanne sat back, frowning. Disquiet knotted her gut. It didn't make sense; she'd felt the blow.

"I can see you'd rather I had something more exciting to tell you," Nghiem said drily. She patted Roxanne's knee. "Perhaps the urine analysis will reveal sudden catastrophic kidney failure."

"We can always hope," Roxanne said. She sighed. "I'm sorry. Thank you. It's just been a little hectic today."

Nghiem pursed her lips. "I've told you, you should rest. Take a few days off and go visit the lakes or something."

Roxanne laughed and reached for her shirt. "Oh, but how can I rest when Metro City needs me?"

"What Metro City needs is someone with a spine," Nghiem retorted. "Preferably several someones. Maybe with big guns." She mimed hefting a bazooka to her shoulder.

"The _last_ thing we need is martial law," Roxanne said. "I don't want them turning Metro City into a war zone."

Nghiem snorted. "It already is. Do you know, the E.R. doctors are pulling double shifts? Megamind may be evil, but he wasn't the only such evil Metro Man fought."

Roxanne held her jacket in her hands. The cloth bunched, folding into long lines. A small, neat hole showed in the shoulder; she fitted her finger into it.

"I know," she said. "When we lost Metro Man the entire city lost its way." She swung her jacket around her back and shrugged into the sleeves.

"Perhaps," Nghiem said thoughtfully, "we should have been less complacent. I think maybe we expected too much of Metro Man."

"I know I expect too much of you," Roxanne said. She clasped Nghiem's arms. "Thanks for getting me in on such short notice, Tham."

Nghiem smiled. "I expect another interview. Primetime," she added.

Roxanne hitched her mouth cartoonishly. "I'm not a miracle worker."

"Then what use are you?" Nghiem asked, crooking her brow.

Roxanne laughed and thumped Nghiem's arm. Briskly, Nghiem embraced her. She squeezed Roxanne roughly about the shoulders.

"Drive safely," she murmured. "And don't overdo it." She released Roxanne. "Call tomorrow for the rest of your results, okay?"

Roxanne rolled her shoulder, grimacing. "Believe me, I won't forget. Tell Lucy and the boys I said hi."

"Yes, of course," Nghiem said. She fluttered her fingers, waving Roxanne out; already, Nghiem was drawn back to the chart.

Roxanne closed the door gently at her back. A nurse swept past her, his head bent over a laden clipboard; she pressed her back to the door to make room for his onward charge.

The smell of smoke surrounded her, wafting from her jacket's collar. She made a face and started down the hall. Maybe she should have showered then come to the hospital. But of course, she thought, she only felt that way _now_ after Tham had taken her worries and thrown them away.

She thumbed the elevator call button and hunched her shoulders, sniffing. Still, she stank. Roxanne looked to the list of floors above the elevator and fluttered one breast of her jacket, airing it out. She liked this jacket, too. Just another one of Megamind's many crimes.

The elevator dinged; the doors opened for her. Roxanne squeezed in past the row of nurses, an older woman in a hospital gown and a wheelchair, and a tall, broad man in a tailored suit. He smiled at her. Roxanne offered him a cool smile in response and looked away to the fore of the elevator. The man shifted, and she felt inside her jacket for her phone.

No reception naturally, not in an elevator and not in the hospital. Tham complained of the thickness of the walls and the inconvenience of landlines often enough. Roxanne made a show of snapping her phone open and clicking through the folders. Three messages from her editor she hadn't read, one from Hal, none from Bernard: she closed her inbox and scrolled through her contacts.

The man in the suit pushed out of the elevator on the third floor and the nurses disembarked on the second, leaving Roxanne with the older woman, who asked sotto voce, "Nosy, wasn't he?"

"A little bit," Roxanne said, and she shared a wry, resigned smile with the woman.

The elevator stopped at the ground floor and Roxanne stepped off into the lobby. Fishing her car keys out of her pocket, she set off for the revolving doors and beyond, the late afternoon falling warm and golden over Metro City. The station first, she thought, then home; she needed to pick her laptop up and talk with her editor.

Halfway to her car, her jacket buzzed, vibrating against her breast. She felt for her phone, stuffed back into the inside pocket. _Whitman, Bernard_ showed on the display. Smiling down at it, Roxanne flipped her phone open and set it to her ear.

"Hello, Bernard?"

"Roxanne!" he said, then more calmly: "Roxanne. Hello. Are you busy? Am I bothering you? Should I call back later? Can I call back later?"

"Bernard," she said, laughing, "Bernard, it's fine. I just got out of the doctor's office. You don't have to call back."

"Oh, thank you," he said with an enormous, bone-deep sigh. "I don't entirely understand this whole phone thing. There's so many buttons. Did you say you just got out from the doctor's?"

"Yep!" she said. She unlocked her car and popped the driver's door open. "And I have a clean bill of health, so no need to worry about me. I'm glad you called, though." She smoothed her hand down the steering wheel and smiled.

"Oh," he said. "Yes. I mean, me too. I'm glad I called."

He was quiet a moment. In that transitory silence, his breath a distant suggestion in her ear, she found her heart fluttering. Roxanne switched the phone to her other ear and started the car.

"So everything is completely normal," he ventured. "Nothing out of the ordinary, like say, the spontaneous development of laser vision, as an off-the-cuff example. Just everyday Roxanne."

"Don't sound too excited," she said drily. "If it makes you feel better, they're still running some tests. I might keel over at any moment."

"No, you're right," he said quickly. "I'm sorry. You're right. I'm—" He hesitated, and when he spoke again he did so carefully, as if the sentiment were strange. "I'm very glad to hear you're alive and not horrifically mutated."

Roxanne laughed helplessly; then Bernard, too, laughed. She looked to the sky, blue beyond her windshield. The sun shone off the car parked before her.

"I mean it, though," he insisted.

"Well, thank you," she told him. She rolled her shoulder, testing it. "It's probably just another one of Megamind's grand failures."

"Failure is such a strong word," Bernard demurred. "I prefer 'educational setback.'"

"I prefer to call a spade a spade," she countered.

Diplomatically he said, "Obviously we have philosophical differences."

"Philosophical differences are good," she said. "A challenge is good." Roxanne checked the mirrors and began pulling out of the space.

"Oh, I agree," he said. "Far worse to stagnate, without intellectual stimulation. I myself enjoy the occasional rousing match of wits. One worldview matched against another—"

"A good old-fashioned debate," she continued, "between two people who respect each other."

"Yes!" he said. "Respect! A willingness to if not entertain the possibility that one's foe's argument may be grounded in truth, then to listen!"

Roxanne flicked her turn signal on and paused at the intersection. The yellow light changed to red. She flexed her hand on the wheel, her knuckles whitening then relaxing.

"We should do that sometime," she said.

"Respect each other?"

She looked to her hand, her thumb tapping an erratic rhythm on the wheel. She stilled it.

"I was thinking more we could meet for coffee," she said. "Go over the photos I took in Megamind's lair and maybe discuss some of our philosophical differences. But respect would be nice, too."

"Oh," he said. "Yes. Yes. Coffee. Sure, that would be— I would love that. Like that. When were you thinking? Not," he added hurriedly, "to rush you, or— Any time is fine with me."

The light changed, green blooming bright and fresh. Roxanne depressed the accelerator and turned into the intersection.

"I'll give you a call tomorrow." She smiled as she finished her loop.

"That'd be great." Wonder wrought him breathless. "I'll be here."

Her smile spilled over, and she fought to straighten it out. "Okay, so: tomorrow. Thanks again for calling, Bernard."

"Of course," he said, then, "Thank you."

"'Bye," she said, and he echoed her.

She clicked her phone shut and tossed it onto the passenger seat. Her shoulder twinged, but only just. Roxanne grinned and set her foot down on the gas.

* * *

"You smell like a fire hazard," her editor said, eyeing her critically. Then Edith turned away. "So long as you have your report filmed and turned in by Thursday next week, we can go ahead with the weekend schedule as planned."

"Thanks," Roxanne said. "I'll get it set up."

"And throw that jacket out!" Edith shouted after her.

She'd sequestered her laptop alongside the camera in her bag and her keys out again as she cut through the department to the elevator, when Hal caught up to her.

"Roxie!" he gasped. He fell against the wall beside her, boxing her in. "Hey, Roxie, did you get my text? Or my voicemail?"

Roxanne threw a smile on. "I'm sorry, Hal. I really haven't had much time to check any—"

"It's no big deal," he said, cutting in. "Just wanted to see how you're doing. What was up with that Bernard guy?" He laughed, then fixed her with an intense stare. "If he's the reason why you got hurt, I could totally talk to him for you. You know, show him who's boss."

"Well, that's very generous of you," she said, "but it wasn't Bernard's fault Megamind shot me."

"Still," Hal said, "I mean, if I'd gone in with you, no way Megamind would've ever got his hands on you."

Roxanne looked to the elevator, which hummed, still rising to meet her.

"Look," she said. "Hal. I've had a really long day. I need some space."

"Oh, sure," he said immediately. He pushed off the wall, nearing her, and Roxanne leaned away. "I'll just talk to you later, okay?"

She smiled, thin-lipped, and made a noncommital noise as he walked backwards from her, firing two clumsy fingerguns.

The elevator opened, empty, before her. Roxanne adjusted her bag and stepped in. She thumbed the doors closed button before she retreated to the side. She leaned her head against the metal paneling, cool and welcome on her skin, and breathed out. Her neck itched, and the stink of smoke rose around her. Roxanne closed her eyes.

The bell rang; the elevator slowed. She straightened and made space for those who boarded. A floor later, she stepped off.

* * *

"Good afternoon, Carlos!" she said as she passed through the lobby.

"Evening, Miss Ritchi." He waved at her from his desk. He'd the paper opened to the crossword puzzle, and a mug of fresh coffee steamed near his hand.

"Anything interesting to report?" he called.

"Not yet," she said, smiling. "But the night's still young."

"Yes, it is," Carlos said with satisfaction. He jabbed his pencil at the paper.

Roxanne took the elevator up to her floor.

In the entryway of her apartment she kicked off her sneakers. The heel of one had scorch marks, dark and fuzzy at the edges.

Roxanne ducked into the bathroom and turned the water on for a warm bath: not hot, not cool, but a nice compromise between the two. Her reflection crouched with her, a woman with heavy hips and thighs, her dark hair twisted up into careless, dirty curls. She tested the water: still chill. Shaking her fingers, she rose.

Her jacket she shed in her bedroom; she left it there on the floor as she shrugged quickly out of her shirt and wiggled out of her jeans. She doubted she could rehabilitate the jacket, but still, she didn't want to just throw it out. Waste not, want not, her father liked to intone. Naked but for underthings, she checked her dresser, gathering fresh undergarments and a set of unfashionable pajamas. She slipped back into the bathroom.

The water still ran cool. She sat on the edge of the tub and rolled her head back, stretching her neck. A dry burn waited behind her eyes, and her bones ached. In the quiet sanctity of her apartment Roxanne allowed herself exhaustion.

Water poured into the tub, gurgling as it spouted from the faucet. She slid her fingers into the rising water and wafted them as she took her day and began, as she did every night, to break it down into its parts, to take from it what she needed, and to set the rest aside to reference again.

Idly she massaged her shoulder. A tiny bump stood out, but that was all. Whatever had struck her hadn't left much of a mark.

Bernard fell through her thoughts then. Roxanne opened her eyes. The ceiling was white, featureless. He'd been very brave, standing up to Megamind as he did. She smiled.

"Spontaneous laser vision," he'd said, off the cuff.

Roxanne screwed up her nose. She squinted at the ceiling and as a joke thought, Burn, baby, burn.

The burn at the back of her eyes flared violently; her vision reddened. In the flittering span of half a heartbeat, she saw two precise holes bore deep into her ceiling.

Roxanne cried out and fell backwards into the tub. She clapped her hands to her eyes, still hot. The water lapped over her, soaking through her panties. Her heart thundered, and the faucet poured cool water on her.

She sat there a moment in the cold water as it rose to touch her breasts. Then she took a breath and lowered her hands to her mouth.

Smoke twisted in two delicate, wisping tails from the holes burnt black into her bathroom ceiling.

Roxanne staggered upright, standing in the tub. Water sloshed against her calves. She squeezed her eyes shut, hard so her vision spotted, then she looked up again. The holes remained.

"This is crazy," she said. "This isn't happening. There is no way I just— burned holes in my ceiling by staring at it; no one can just—"

She thought of Metro Man, his eyes glowing, red light spilling forth in two tight and burning beams.

Roxanne sat back down in the water.

"Megamind," she breathed.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to _Megamind_. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction.

I cannot begin to thank Rawles enough for her work as editor. Restructuring and rewriting this chapter was a nightmare, but it was a profitable and necessary nightmare, and it is thanks to her advice to do so (and where to begin) that this chapter is anything other than a total disaster.

Thanks also to everyone who has read, reviewed, or favorited this! I'm very thankful for your patience and for your support, and I hope you'll stick around.

* * *

**Our Beautiful Tomorrow  
**Chapter Three.

* * *

Roxanne slapped the water off. The faucet gurgled then the flow thinned and stopped. She staggered out of the tub, dripping cold water as she dressed quickly in sweats and t-shirt. The sweatpants, already soaking through, clung to her thighs.

The camera. She needed the camera. Nausea bloomed in her belly; she tamped it down.

Her apartment was warm, but the water had cooled her, and the dry air on her damp skin called up goosepimples from her arms. Water beaded the small of her back. Roxanne crossed her arms against the chill and hurried to her canvas bag, dropped on the sofa as she'd come in.

The few brief minutes it took to set up her laptop dragged on. She scratched at her hair and stared at the loading screen. Holes, she thought; she had burned holes in the ceiling. She wondered if she'd burnt straight through to the floor above and how she'd explain that to the superintendent, then she fisted her hands in her hair. Her stomach bucked.

"Calm down," she said. "Calm down. You're fine. It's okay."

Why the hell had she gone charging into Megamind's lair like that anyway? Because, she thought viciously, no one else would. She laughed, then clenched her teeth against the edge of it.

The laptop sang one high note. Roxanne breathed against her wrists and counted to ten. She smoothed her hands down the back of her neck.

"Okay," she said. Her voice resounded in the stillness of her apartment. "Okay. Focus. One thing at a time."

Roxanne turned to her laptop.

She'd taken few photos before Megamind's brainbots had come roaring down from above—a handful compared to the tapestry that had masked so broad a wall. Even if there was anything here in the handful of close shots she'd snapped, it might not be enough. She set her jaw and opened the folder.

One of the photos was garbage, blurred as she'd turned to see the advancing brainbots. That, she deleted. Two more she flagged as meaningless; those she minimized.

A flash of red caught her eye: a long sheet of paper covered with Megamind's cramped scrawl. She maximized the file and zoomed in on the top right corner. Unfolding on the couch, she reached for a notebook and somewhere in the recesses of her bag, a working pen.

Writing by hand calmed her, and the work of finding patterns and meaning with so little to go off of caught her as it always did. The sun set, passing through the sky and casting long shadows in its wake. One by one, the lights of Metro City flickered on, bright in the heavy dark of night.

A beep sounded: her laptop, warning of a low battery. Roxanne slapped it shut. The lid clicked into place beneath her hand. She stayed there a moment, her hand on top of the computer, the notebook balanced in her lap. Her skin prickled. Then she rose, tossing her notebook aside.

It was impossible. No, she thought, implausible, absolutely incredible that Megamind would want to create another superhero to, what? Destroy? Another superhero to catch him and send him back to jail? Did he miss having his butt kicked on a regular basis? Miss the humiliation, the jeering crowds?

She turned round to face her loft, the glass doors to the balcony at her back.

"He's got everything he wanted," she said, "and he wants someone to take it away from him? It doesn't make sense. Maybe— Maybe I'm looking at this wrong. I need to take a step back. I need to rethink this."

She scrubbed at her face. Her fingertips pushed against her eyes, and the pressure, dull and immediate, called up the memory of red light and the delicate scent of smoke. She dropped her hands. Her apartment spread before her, narrow and sleek and quiet but for her breathing and the whisper of air.

If she went back to Megamind's lair— Roxanne paced, mapping the living room. If she went back, then what? What could she possibly ask of him? A reason? Something to make sense of this? The sweatpants hung, heavy at her hips.

He hadn't intended to shoot her; she knew that much. He'd shouted when the gun fired between them, though she guessed that might have been as much out of fear for himself as anything else. Why hadn't he come after her? Then she thought of the brainbots chasing her and Bernard, and of the weight of the gun in her hand as she turned to throw it. The glass bulb had shattered first, then the metal had warped and burst.

Roxanne stopped at the foot of the couch. She looked out the glass doors to the lights of the buildings across the street. She cupped her hand against her forehead. Her skin felt hot, near feverish. A thin reflection of herself stared back at her from the doors.

"He can't take it away from me," she said to her reflection. "That's why he hasn't come after me." She ran her fingers through her bangs, carding them back from her brow. "He wouldn't have a back-up. He never does. He probably doesn't even remember where the plans are."

She supposed she was lucky she hadn't died. But a superhero? He wanted a superhero. Why did he want a superhero? Roxanne pulled at her hair till her scalp ached with it.

She needed a drink.

A bottle of cheap supermarket wine reclined at the back of her refrigerator. Roxanne dug it out and fished a square glass from the cupboard. The foil on the cap stuck then gave way at last, and Roxanne poured a half-glass. She belted that down right there in her kitchen, then she poured out another half. The glass was cool against her fingers. She looked down to it, watching the small ripples washing through the wine.

She should text Bernard. The clock over the stove showed half past nine, ticking over to 9:31. The soft hum of the refrigerator rose around her. Roxanne rested her head against it. She drew in a steadying breath. The clock changed again. Tomorrow. She would text him tomorrow.

Roxanne hefted the bottle and the glass, and she carried both with her to the balcony. Her sweatpants drooped, the hem hooked beneath her heels. The glamour of it struck her as she kneed the door open.

"This is Roxanne Ritchi," she said to her reflection, warped in the angled glass, "reporting from my apartment, where I'm having a nervous breakdown."

She slipped out onto the balcony, the bottle of Arbor Mist heavy in one hand, the glass light in the other. She set the bottle down on the parapet and took another mouthful of wine. It slithered, bitter, along her tongue. Cradling the glass to her chest, she drew her shoulders together and leaned out over Metro City.

The city lights shone, glimmering like small stars. A wind bore down between the apartment buildings towering along the block; it carded through her hair. Her sleeves ruffled. Far below, a siren wailed, and the whine vibrated in her ear.

Roxanne turned from the wind, brushing her bangs back from the corner of her eye. There, in the dark, Megamind's lair waited. Was he there, she wondered, obsessing over his failure, or did he spend his evenings at City Hall gloating over his triumph?

"So why did you do it?" She tightened her hand about the glass and thought of pitching it in his face. Her wrist ached. "If you didn't want to win, why did you kill him?"

The wind dragged at her. Roxanne looked down to her drink, translucent and shyly pink. She rolled the glass between her fingers.

Another siren cut through the night. An ambulance screamed down streets Metro City had abandoned in the wake of Megamind's rise. Roxanne closed her eyes and _listened_.

In the silence of the night she heard: the ambulance roaring, a man shouting, the muffled sobs of a child, the blistering snap of a gun firing.

Roxanne jerked, pushing away from the parapet. The glass spilled, thrown on its side; it rolled off and fell the fifteen floors to the sidewalk where it shattered. She covered her ears against the splintering cacophony.

Had Metro Man heard this: the city, crying out? The vastness of Metro City subsumed her. Roxanne sank into a crouch and bowed her head to her knees. Somewhere out on the edges of the city a woman screamed then was silent. Roxanne's gut lurched. She clapped her hands over her ears, and the sound was like thunder muffled in cloth.

Her heart stuttered. Roxanne focused on that rushed beating, her breathing, the faint rustle of the wind stirring her hair.

Slowly, the world receded.

Roxanne shifted, cradling her head. Her eyes itched, wet. The smooth tiles of the balcony were cool beneath her toes.

Metro City murmured, calling. Was this what Megamind wanted? She dug her nails into her hair, pinching her scalp.

"Why aren't you happy?" she bit through her teeth. "Isn't this what you wanted? You selfish, _awful_—" She broke off, hiding her face in the crook of her elbow.

She remained on the balcony until she could dry her eyes and trust them to stay so. The moon shone, fat and brilliant. Roxanne stood carefully. She lifted the bottle from the rail, weighing it, and looked out across the city. Then she went inside and closed the doors on the balcony.

One by one she turned out the lights.

* * *

Dawn blossomed. Roxanne padded through her apartment, coffee mug firmly in hand. Sleeplessness stretched her bones and filled her head with scattered, unformed thoughts. The night faded fully, and she found day had come again no different than before. The kitchen clock ticked the seconds to the hour; four rolled into five rolled into six at last. Sunlight lit her loft, fine as air.

The thought of calling out sick occurred to her once, but as she looked to her cell she thought of that report, due the week after, and of the proposal locked in her desk and the segment she needed to film for _Wake Up, Metro City_. Roxanne sighed and pressed her wrist to her brow. She smoothed her thumb down the back of her phone. Then she straightened and flicked her phone open.

She selected _Whitman, Bernard_ in her contacts list and opened the text message screen. _Still up for coffee?_ she wrote. She hesitated a moment, then she punched send and rose to dress, tossing her phone aside on the coffee table. He probably wasn't even up yet.

The phone buzzed suddenly, clattering toward the edge. Roxanne dove for it. God knew it had taken enough abuse over the last few months. She flicked it open again.

One new message: Bernard, writing, _coffee great. where at? lol :-)_

Roxanne settled back against the couch. She cradled the phone in her hand. Her loft was silent, waiting. She'd called him her partner the day before, as he held his hands out to her.

_Starbuck's on Smoketown and 23rd,_ she typed. _7:30 OK?_

A moment, then her phone buzzed again. Bernard filled the screen.

_730! can't wait. see you there. lol :-)_

Roxanne smiled, the first she had in hours. _Thanks! Hope it isn't any trouble._ Then, as the thought struck her, she added, _LOL. ;)_

She snapped her phone shut. Seven-thirty. That gave her time enough to shower and to dress.

Roxanne looked out the balcony doors to the sunlight creeping over the parapets and spilling across the stones.

"Okay," she said.

* * *

She spotted Bernard by his scarecrow hair. Roxanne smiled and hitched her bag high upon her shoulder. Weaving through the breakfast crowd, she snuck up behind him. Lightly, she tapped his arm.

Bernard, his face turned up to the menu, started and turned sharply to his left, then his right. His glasses sat crooked on his nose, and he blinked owlishly at her, his green eyes wide. Roxanne smiled.

"Oh!" he said. He smoothed his sweater over his breast. "Hello. It's you. Roxanne." He smiled. His face lit.

"Sorry I'm late," she said. "The drive took a little longer than I expected. Traffic's backed up all down twentieth. I hope you weren't waiting long."

"No, I just got here myself." He fixed his glasses, setting them straight. "I like your blouse. The sleeves are fascinating."

Roxanne laughed, surprised, and touched her arm. The cloth fluttered, loose. She'd worn a light blouse with sleeves that billowed at the elbows and tapered at the wrists.

Bernard winced. "I'm sorry. I don't have much practical experience with social niceties. Was that inappropriate? It goes well with your skirt." He finished with such a look of misery, Roxanne had to turn away that she wouldn't laugh in his face.

"No, it's fine. I just wasn't expecting any of that."

"I'll try to warn you next time," he said ruefully.

"Thank you," she said gravely, "I'd appreciate that. So!"

She looked to the menu, and Bernard followed suit. Roxanne peeked up at him. His lips parted. He'd a curl of hair tucked behind his ear, a tamed escapee from the rest of the wild golden nest.

"Have you ordered yet?" she asked.

"I've never been here before," he admitted. His brow wrinkled. "I feel like an explorer lost in a strange culture, surrounded by alien customs. The drinks lingo alone could take years to crack." He gestured widely to the menu, his fingers hooking.

"Wow, you really don't get out." She set her hands on her hips, cocked her brow, and said, "Well, for a limited time only, you have Roxanne Ritchi, ace reporter and cafe native, on hand to translate. Whatever you want, ask away."

"Anything?" He fanned his hand out, as if across a table. "Anything at all."

"Anything at all."

Bernard cupped his chin, resting his elbow on his other arm. He squinted up at the menu. Roxanne smiled at the small frown pulling at his mouth.

"All right," he said at last. He pointed. "There. What on Earth is a caramel mackeeyaytoo?"

"Caramel macchiato."

Bernard flittered his fingers as if to say, what's the difference?

"It's basically a vanilla latte with extra foam and caramel stirred in," she told him. "A little sweet, though."

"Ahh." He stroked his lower lip, creasing it beneath his thumb. His eyes flickered to her. "And a latte. What's that?"

"Espresso with milk and foam. Unsweetened, unless you ask."

"Mocha vay-leen-cee-yuh."

"Mocha valencia," she said clearly, minding the vowels. "Mocha with extra espresso and orange syrup. Very sweet." She rounded her eyes and pulled her lips down.

"Mocha, plain."

"Espresso, milk, and chocolate. But don't let the chocolate trick you. It's not sweet."

He snapped off, "Caramel frappuccino," at her, his inflection perfect, and Roxanne laughed and clapped her hands before her throat.

"I'm guessing you like caramel," she said, teasing.

He spread his hands. "You've caught me. My tawdriest secret uncovered at last."

"Don't sell yourself so short," she said. She nudged him gently with her shoulder. "I'm sure you have much nastier secrets."

Bernard scoffed at this. "Who can define what's nasty and what's not? Is taking candy from small, helpless children really so wrong?"

"I just solved the case of the candy burglar," she told him.

"Oh, did you!" He leaned nearer, his large eyes larger yet. He'd a halo of pale lashes framing each deep, green eye. His cartoonish frown teased. "Well, I for one can't wait for that groundbreaking report."

"If you're not too full of all that candy you're stealing from babies," she said drily, "do you know what you want to drink?"

He settled and said, "That last one, the caramel frappuccino? Whatever that is, I want three."

"Three!" Her eyebrows shot up, and she felt another laugh rising.

"I'm on a high energy diet," he said primly.

She considered him: slight and not much taller than her. "Well, the frappuccino should take care of that. I'm guessing you want them venti?"

Bernard touched his stomach and held his other hand up, guarding. "Oh, no, thank you, I'm allergic."

Helpless, Roxanne covered her eyes and shook through her laugh. She peeked over her fingers at Bernard, who smiled cluelessly, and turned away.

"A venti is a large," she managed at last. "Extra espresso."

He made a soft ohhh noise and nodded. "Then I'd like to change my no to a yes. Is it really so funny?"

She waved her hand at him. "It's just—"

She looked at him, standing there in his navy turtleneck and his pressed suit with its neat, clean lines. Bernard blinked and the lights overhead winked off his glasses. Roxanne smiled again, feeling it soft on her face.

"I thought for sure you were the kind of guy who came in to a Starbucks every day at noon with this long order for the same drink every day," she confessed. "You know, the guy who holds up the line for ten minutes to complain about how he ordered an extra shot of syrup, not sugar." She lifted her hand in a loose fist, mock-remonstrative.

"I suppose," Bernard said slowly, thinking, "we aren't always what we've led others to believe."

"I guess not," she said, and he smiled at her like the sun rising.

Roxanne smoothed her hair behind her ear. She looked again to the menu. "So what do you feel like eating?"

* * *

They took a table in the back, near a narrow window which looked out on a small courtyard that was littered with loose paper and trash. A looping XXNO PASS marred the far wall in bright red, a warning from one gang to another. Sunlight spilled pale and thin across the table.

"What's this really about?" Bernard said. "You didn't call me out just to buy me coffee."

She turned from the window. He smiled again, a small and encouraging crook of his mouth. Yesterday he'd spat dust from his mouth and helped her to her feet.

Roxanne leaned over the table, and Bernard mirrored her, closing the space between them. His wrist struck one of his frappuccinos and he looked down, diverted.

"I know what Megamind's planning," she said quietly so that the man who swept past their table wouldn't hear.

Bernard looked up, surprise widening his mouth. "What, already? You've figured out his— It hasn't even been a day."

She pinched off a dry half-smile. "Hmm, well, it would've taken longer if he hadn't shot me."

"I'm sure he didn't intend to shoot you," Bernard said, comforting. "It was probably all some crazy mix-up." He leaned closer, clasping his hands, then unclasping them to tug out his cuffs. "And what exactly is he planning?"

"That's the thing. It doesn't even make sense." She sat back and gestured to the window and the courtyard, stricken with the disease that crept through Metro City. "Metro City is his. He got what he wanted when he killed Metro Man."

Bernard's face drew tight, shuttering. At the museum, sorrow had bowed his shoulders and filmed his eyes. Roxanne reached across the table and covered his hand with her own. He looked to her, and beneath her palm his fingers shifted, half-flexing. She squeezed his hand once and let go.

Bernard cleared his throat. "So," he said, drawing the frappuccino near. He fumbled for the straw. "What about this mysterious plan doesn't make sense?"

"Well," she reasoned, "for one, he's trying to make a new superhero."

Bernard choked on his drink.

"Exactly," she said, triumphant. "But why would he want someone to fight? Did he like getting his butt kicked?"

"Who enjoys having their butt kicked?" Bernard rasped, hand at his throat. "I mean, that just seems a little—" He laughed, then pressed his fist to his mouth, holding back a cough.

"All I can think is he must miss the challenge," and she rolled her eyes at this. "Which is rich." She stabbed at her salad. "He kills Metro Man, he takes over the city, the police won't stand up to him or anyone else, and now the gangs are running wild, the city is a dump, no one will go outside after dark—"

Roxanne broke off. She glared out the window at the graffiti lining the bricks across the way, at the trash now fluttering in a small breeze trapped in the courtyard.

"He won," she said, "and now he doesn't want it."

He waited, quiet. Roxanne breathed out, harsh through her nose. A couple with a screaming child in tow entered the shop, the toddler's yells drowning out the bell ringing.

After another moment, Bernard ventured, "You said, if he hadn't shot you. I thought the— whatever it was— that it failed."

She grimaced and rubbed her arm, near her shoulder. When she'd dressed for work she had checked her back in the mirror and seen nothing, no scab, no bruise, no mark of any sort. The ache in her arm had faded, too, the muscle stretching easily and without complaint. She'd trailed her fingers across the smooth skin and stared at herself in the mirror for a long and silent minute.

Now Roxanne turned to Bernard.

"Believe me," she said, "I hate saying this, but Megamind's plan wasn't a complete failure."

"You mean—" Bernard rose, suffused with sudden energy. "The— It worked?"

"I don't know what it was," she told him. "But when I got home last night, I..."

Bernard leaned closer still, his eyes enormous, his smile transformative.

"I had," she said, and it was too much suddenly, all of it too much: the bolt firing, the holes in her ceiling, the ambulance wailing in the night, Bernard with his throat sleek as, breathless, he lifted his face to hers.

"Oh, God," she said, "this must sound nuts to you."

"No!" he said immediately. "No, absolutely not. No more nuts than—" He cast about. "Than a mocha vellumca."

Roxanne heaved a laugh and covered her face. Very delicately he touched her arms, not drawing them down, but simply touching them. She slid her hands down, pressing her fingers to her lips. Bernard smiled sweetly.

"Maybe a demonstration?" he suggested. "Just to prove to yourself you aren't imagining things."

She drew a breath, and exhaustion receded, lurking yet at the edges.

"Good idea," she said. She parted her hands and smiled gratefully at him. The corners of his mouth softened.

The sunlight shifted, a cloud rolling across the sun, casting a thin shadow over them. Roxanne ran her fork through the salad.

"Let's finish lunch first."

"Better idea," he said, his eyes crinkling.

* * *

What wind had stirred through the courtyard had gone when Roxanne led Bernard through the small and broken gate. The gate sighed on its hinges; it hung at a crooked downward angle. A week-old newspaper lay still and silent at the corner where the alley opened into the courtyard, a skinny box laid with cobblestones. Her heels clicked, sharp as flint on the rocks.

Roxanne pointed. "That used to be a bookstore." Her voice echoed off the walls and faded. "Calli's Used and New. They closed a month ago."

She stopped at the heart of the courtyard and revolved on her heel, looking up to the clouded sky.

"This whole street used to be alive. Megamind killed that, too."

Bernard turned with her. He looked away from her to a line of windows, their curtains drawn against the courtyard. His shoulder bent slightly. Roxanne touched his back, and he cleared his throat.

"You were going to show me," he said. He turned back to her. His mouth sloped as his shoulder did, but he smiled. "A demonstration of your might."

"Not that mighty."

"Yet," he corrected, and it fell like a drop of rain in her chest.

"Well," she said with forced lightness, "here goes."

She checked that she stood clear of that tall window set into the side of the Starbucks, then she looked to the wall where someone had painted XXNO PASS. Her eyes itched. She breathed out, slow and even. She thought of building heat and fired.

The twin beams cut into the brick with a violent, grinding snarl. Dust and smoke poured out of the spraypainted O, and Roxanne closed her eyes. The heat cut off. Her head hurt, but it was a distant hurt. When she opened her eyes, the itch had dwindled to a suggestion.

She had done that: burned into brick as if it were paper. The thought was sharp and cold, and it unsettled her belly; but so too did it exhilirate her, her heart tripping quickly in her breast. To see this here in daylight with another as witness: it was different. It was real.

She turned to Bernard, smiling so her face hurt. His face was slack as he looked from the wall to her.

"So, not so nuts after all," she said.

He laughed wildly and caught her face in his hands. "You did it!" he shouted, and he spun away from her, his fists raised to the sky. "Look at this! You did it!"

She laughed too. "I did, didn't I?" She had. She had.

He spun about, his hair thick like smoke. That sudden energy suffused him. His eyes shone.

"Roxanne, with this, you can fight Megamind! You can use these, these powers to face him! To defeat him!"

"I'm going to need some training first," she told him.

"Yes, of course. There are so many powers you have to master: flying, ice breath, super speed, your stupendous super strength, heat vision—" He gestured to the wall.

"Super hearing," she said.

She folded her arms across her chest and stood beside him. Bernard looked up, breathing as if he'd run a mile to come here to this spot. Roxanne looked up as well. XXNO PASS, the wall said. A bottle rolled against her foot.

"And I can help you," Bernard was saying. "I know everything about Metro Man, his powers—"

"Thank you," she said. "Bernard." She touched his elbow and turned from him as he turned to her.

Roxanne looked the courtyard over: dirtied, abandoned, cracked and overgrown with litter and weeds and the sick of the city. The wind carried the sound of breaking glass to her, of glass crunching beneath heavy feet. She tightened her arms about her chest.

"Megamind's not the only thing we have to deal with. The entire city needs change."

"It needs a hero," said Bernard at her back.

"Yes," she said, listening. The wind sang. "It does."


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to _Megamind_. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction.

Thanks are once more due Rawles for her work as editor, and, of course, you for reading.

* * *

**Our Beautiful Tomorrow**  
Chapter Four.

* * *

He preceded her out of the courtyard. Bernard turned, bouncing on his toes. He canted his head to one side.

"Aren't you excited?"

Roxanne stopped to close the gate. It hung heavily from that weakened hinge, and when she let go it began to swing open again, rasping across the cobblestones. She turned from it.

Bernard waited for her in the alley's shadow, his hands folded at his back. She fell in beside him, and together they walked from the alley into the sun.

"I am a little," she admitted. "But it's strange to think about. I don't have much experience with waking up with superpowers."

"Yes, that seems like it would be disconcerting," he said. She shot him a look, but he seemed earnest.

The sidewalk was clear, the road still but for a lone car rushing down the opposite lane. A beautiful day in Metro City, she thought. Roxanne tipped her face up to the morning sun where it peeked between towering apartment buildings.

Bernard stood beside her, but he looked to her and not the sun.

"Perhaps it's fate," he ventured. "Perhaps destiny picked you for this. Out of all the millions of people in the city, for you to have been chosen; it must be fate."

Roxanne shook her head, smiling wryly. "I don't believe in fate or destiny or—" She fluttered her fingers toward the sky. "Or the movement of the stars."

"Maybe the stars believe in you," Bernard said, then he looked away. He touched his glasses, pressing them close to his eyes.

Her smile deepened, then she too looked away, again to the sky. Storm clouds neared, a dark suggestion rising to fill the spaces between the spires and arches of Metro City. The fragrance of coming rain clogged the air. She needed to speak with Hal about filming before the clouds broke open.

A breeze dragged at her hair. She shook her bangs from her eyes and turned back to Bernard.

"Whatever the stars believe," she said, "I'm glad you believe in me."

Bernard ducked his head. He peered up at her. He'd bit his lower lip; his smile pulled it flat.

"Well," he said, "after that display, it would be hard not to."

Roxanne laughed and brushed at her hair again, sweeping it from her eyes. Unaccountably, she felt like the girl she'd been once in school: the girl who had gone out of her way to interview a particular theatre major not simply because she thought his set design inspired, but because he listened when she talked. Then she thought, no. Not unaccountable.

The sun dappled Bernard's hair, polishing it gold.

Roxanne said, "Thanks for coming out. I know you must be busy with the museum, or what's left of it."

"Ah, yes," Bernard said. "That's priority number one. There's just so much to do with that whole thing. Redesigning, rebuilding. Reconnoitering. Painting..." He passed his hands over each other. His nose wrinkled.

She grimaced. "I'm sorry. That was rude of me. It must still hurt, losing your life's work like that." Then she groaned and covered her eyes, her fingers hooked at her temples. "Sorry again. I am just out of it today."

He laughed and bent to peek up at her between her arms. "No, it's quite all right. The, ah, renovations look promising. In fact, I'm finding it all very rejuvenating."

She eyed him between her thumbs, then slid her hands back over her brow, running her fingers through her hair. "Really? Rejuvenating? Having to rebuild everything you lost?"

"It's a new challenge," he said. "And I don't think of it as losing my life's work. I'm just redefining it."

"You're handling this a lot better than I expected," she said.

Bernard gestured toward her. "What—" The door to the Starbucks opened and a trio of teenagers in loose dress cascaded, laughing, onto the sidewalk. Roxanne stepped aside. Her arm brushed Bernard's; their elbows knocked softly.

He leaned close and continued. "What about you? I would have thought it would take time to adjust to, you know." He squinted fiercely at a fire hydrant across the street.

"Do you have something in your eye?" she teased.

Bernard leaned back, pouting. She considered nudging him, her hip against his, then she thought better of it.

"I'm still thinking about it," she said. "I didn't get much sleep last night, though, so a breakdown isn't completely off the table."

"I can't really imagine you ever losing your cool," Bernard said. "You certainly never gave Megamind the satisfaction."

"You've never actually met Megamind, have you?"

"I always found him to have a certain roguish charm," Bernard said, "like a young and more handsome Humphrey Bogart."

"You two have that in common," she told him.

Bernard frowned. It looked cartoonish on him somehow, like a kid playing at insult. She'd never thought that before. Before, he'd worn his irritation like an old shirt. She wondered at that, then started when one of the teenagers standing at the corner shouted, "You guys, we're late!"

Roxanne made a show of checking her watch. "Sorry, Bernard, but I need to go." She needed to have gone five minutes ago. She tried not to think of that. "I have some work to do at the station."

"Of course!" he said. "I also have many things to do today."

Roxanne smiled at him. "Thanks again for coming out to meet with me."

"Any time," Bernard said, and he smiled too.

She hesitated a moment, then she reached out to him and hugged him fleetingly about the shoulders. Bernard went still against her, then the line of his shoulders softened and his hand fluttered at her side.

Roxanne settled back. She drew a quick breath and said, "So I'll call you later this week."

"Yes," he said, "please do." He touched his arm, then dropped his hand again.

She flashed him a short wave, her fingers curled. Then she turned.

"For what it's worth," Bernard called to her, and she turned around again, looking over her shoulder. "Everything you said the other night at the museum, about what makes a hero: bravery, strength—"

"Determination," she said.

His cheek dimpled. The sun shone at his back, limning his hair so it gleamed like a halo. "Who better to challenge Megamind than you?"

The wind pulled at her sleeves, calling her to work. Her stomach tightened, twisting about itself.

"Someone has to stand up to him," she said.

"Well, whatever the reason," he said, "I'm glad it's you."

Roxanne touched her brow fleetingly, then laughing, she lowered her hand.

"I'll call you tomorrow, Bernard."

He bowed, his arm at his waist. He straightened. "I'll be waiting."

She left him there on the sidewalk outside the narrow Starbucks. Her heels clicked on the asphalt as she crossed the street, first slowly then quickly as she lengthened her strides. June swallowed her, the morning already warm. She grinned at the sun.

* * *

Roxanne arrived at the station at ten to nine. The features department bustled, the morning staff well represented if not fully there. Hal hadn't come in yet, of course. She checked her watch, the spindly second arm ticking around the face. She supposed it was too much to expect Hal to show up on time.

She could call Hal and try to arrange things with him on the phone, but the last time she'd tried that, he'd trapped her in an excruciating vortex of niceties, awkward come-ons, and loud declarations that he couldn't hear her; could she say that again? Better to wait for him to come to the station. If nothing else it would save her worrying about sparing his feelings on the phone without the excuse of needing to go somewhere else to do something else with someone else.

"Morning, Roxie," Tina called from her desk.

"Morning," Roxanne returned, en route to her own.

Her proposal—the notes for her proposal, anyway—sat where she'd left it, locked in the bottom drawer of her desk. She fished the packet out, nicked a pen from the jug in the drawer above, and began scratching through her notes. The scrape of the felt tip across the paper filled her ears, and she focused on that rather than the murmuring of the station around her.

A spot had opened in the fall's Friday line-up, not much, just a ten minute segment in the nine o'clock news, but she thought she had a good shot at it. Her first thought had been to propose an exposé on Megamind's activities, but: as she dragged the pen down a line reading _exam. poss. connection between electr. demands of bbots + outages Art. Gard._, she thought instead of the ambulance crying as it swept down the street. She thought of the police setting down their arms as Megamind emerged from the fog and of the report of a gun fired not to defend, but to attack.

She wrote, _We need to change_, and she paused, her pen poised on the e's curling underbelly. The pen bled a dark spot onto the page. Roxanne set her jaw and wrote, _Propose: exam. non-super crim. act. in M.C. + necess. of reestab. govt W/O MARTIAL LAW_.

A bang jolted her. Roxanne caught the proposal up against her chest. Lucy squinted at Roxanne from her perch on Roxanne's desk. Her haze of blonde hair stood out like lightning.

"You look like crap," she said. "Do you need a coffee?" She turned and shouted, "Harry! Get Roxanne a coffee! I don't know, black! Two creams! Jesus, Harry!"

Roxanne set the proposal down. Checking her blouse for ink stains, she found one, a delicate spot at the collar. Resigned, she said, "Good morning, Lucy."

Lucy crossed her legs and pulled at her skirt, tucking it back down to her knees. "Tham says you saw her yesterday. Now aside from my wife's incredible good looks and impeccable bedside manner, what reason would you have for seeing her in the middle of the workday?"

"I have no comment at this time," Roxanne said primly. "Please direct any further questions to my attorney."

Lucy laughed and jumped from Roxanne's desk. "This isn't an interrogation," she told her. "I just want to make sure you're okay. Hal came in yesterday blabbing about how you'd been shot and it was all Bert's fault and—" She made a flapping mouth gesture with her hand.

Roxanne covered her face and groaned, "Hal."

Lucy touched her shoulder gently. "You okay?"

Roxanne breathed into her cupped hands for a moment, the shadow cast by her palms a fleeting relief. She smoothed her hands down her face and smiled at Lucy.

"Yes, I'm fine," she said. "I need to talk to Hal, though."

"He won't listen," Lucy reminded her. "He's not like Harry. Harry, you wonderful man!"

"The coffee cart is seriously right over there," Harry told Lucy. "Ten steps away. I counted." He winked at Roxanne and handed her a coffee, then presented Lucy with a cup.

"Oh, Harry," Lucy crooned, "you're so sweet. For me?"

"Nope," he said, taking one large step back. He swigged a sip from the cup and waggled his eyebrows before he spun around on his heel and sauntered off, hips swinging.

"Harry, you liar!" Lucy shouted after him. "That coffee's not that good!"

"This would be why Tham worries about you at work." Roxanne sipped her own coffee: black, two creams. She wished she had a third cream. Maybe a fourth.

"What, about Harry?" Lucy asked, diverted. "Please, he's too hairy. You sure you're okay? 'Cause if you're sure I'll leave you alone, promise."

Roxanne smiled at her. She cupped her coffee between her hands and said, "I'm sure. Really. Thanks for checking on me."

Lucy rapped her knuckles on Roxanne's desk, knocking out a staggered three-count, then she nodded as if satisfied.

"You're welcome for the coffee, too," she said.

Roxanne turned back to her desk and the proposal fanned out before her, then Lucy said, drawing her back, "Oh! Rats! I forgot to ask about Bert!"

"Bernard," Roxanne called. "His name is Bernard."

"Oh, well, no wonder Hal's jealous," Lucy said. "Berrrnarrrd." She made a face and vanished around the near corner.

"Hey, good news," Harry said, standing at Roxanne's elbow. "I think only half the department heard that."

"He's just a friend," Roxanne said lightly. "I barely even know him."

"Ye-es," Harry said meaningfully. He presented Roxanne with another packet of cream, filched from the cart. "I didn't want to risk the wrath of Lucy."

She snapped the packet up. "Thank you, Harry. You're a godsend."

"That's what my mother says," he agreed. "By the way, your cameraman's here. He's making moon eyes in the corner."

Roxanne sighed. "I should probably go talk to him, huh?"

Harry rested his hand on her shoulder and gravely bowed his head. "It's a far, far better thing that you do, than I and so on." Then he clapped her soundly on the shoulder and said brightly, "Have fun."

"I take it back," Roxanne said, eyeing him. "You're a heel."

"Also what my mother says," Harry confessed. He shrugged and sauntered off again to his own cluttered death trap of a desk. A googly-eyed gag pen bobbed sadly in his back pocket.

Roxanne turned away, snorting into her hand. She chanced a glance over her shoulder and yep, there was Hal at his desk, peering over his opened laptop at her. She dumped the packet of cream into her coffee and pushed away from her desk, grabbing the chart delegated to the near corner.

Hal looked up at her approach. "Hey, Roxie!" He twirled to meet her, the swivel chair rolling beneath him. He beamed. "What's up?"

"Hi, Hal," she said, smiling. "Listen, I need to talk with you about the Metro Man retrospective." She presented him with the report, _ta-da_.

"Geez, another retrospective?" He scowled down at the chart. "You know, they should really give you something new to do. Something cool and kind of exciting, you know?"

"Let's focus on this for now," she reminded him. "We need to do location filming tomorrow. I thought maybe we could do bookends with the Metro Man Museum. Could you compile a backdrop from archives?"

"You mean from before the museum exploded everywhere?" Hal asked. "Sure, no problem. I'll get that together and we can green screen it later."

"And I'll work on getting clearance to film on-site," she said. She gestured to the chart, forgotten in his lap. "I made a list of some other places I'd like to film at. Let me know if you have any ideas, okay?" She turned.

"Oh, hey!" he called, and Roxanne looked back over her shoulder. He half rose from his chair and caught the chart as it began to tumble. "Let's grab some brunch. I know it's early, but I know this great pizza place; they've got like the most amazing garlic bread—"

She held her hands up between them. "I don't really feel like pizza right now."

"That's okay. We don't have to do pizza. We could just grab some coffee and hang out."

"I'm good with coffee." She hefted her cup. "I really do need to get that clearance. But thank you. And you can put the backdrop together?"

Hal sank, filling his chair. "Yeah," he said, "I'll do that."

"Thanks, Hal." She smiled at him. Hal, his gaze fixed somewhere about her hips, didn't return it.

Roxanne swapped the coffee cup from one hand to the other and left him at his desk. The chair creaked after a moment; he rotated back to face his laptop. The soft hairs at the back of her neck stood; her skin tightened. Hal looking at her over his laptop, she thought. She didn't turn around, but marched past her desk.

Harry chewed on his gag pen, the plastic bright between his teeth, as he clattered at his keyboard. His nerd glasses sat low on his long, dark brown nose. He'd that particular unfocused look that meant he was very focused.

Roxanne tapped his shoulder and said, "Hey."

He started, cracking the pen's casing in his jaw. Ink dribbled onto his lip. He withdrew the pen from his mouth and stared morosely down at it.

"Aw, fig snot," he said, as harsh a cuss as she'd ever heard from him.

She winced. "Sorry, Harry. I didn't mean to, ah—" She gestured, encompassing the ink spattered black on his tie.

"This pen was a gift," he said. "A gift, Roxanne, from a very special woman."

"Your mother buys you gag pens?"

He stared at her, his brow flat, his mouth as straight. Then he said, "As a matter of fact, yes."

"I'll buy you ten," she promised, "and they'll be even more unprofessional. Do you still have the phone number for the relocated city hall?"

Harry tossed the pen aside. It flopped into the bin, its googly eyes crossed. "Yeah, I got it. Don't you?" He rummaged in the top drawer.

Roxanne glanced over her shoulder, back at her desk and, beyond, Hal hunched before his laptop. He shifted, his shoulders rising.

"I must've misplaced it," she said, turning back to Harry.

"Here you go." He handed her his contacts book. "I need that back, though."

She tucked the book back against her wrist. "Who do I look like to you? Carter?"

"Do you know, he still owes me twenty?"

"Maybe I could rough him up for you." She feigned boxing.

Harry grinned. "You look like you could take him," he said. "You've been hitting the gym?"

Roxanne paused. She settled back on her heels. Her sleeves loosened at her shoulders, no longer drawn tight over her arms. Her still slender but now defined arms, what fat had hung there made muscle.

She put on a pleased smile. "You noticed? I've been trying to make time for it, but I'm so busy, it seems like I don't ever get to go."

He shrugged. "Well, you look fine to me. It's probably all that kidnapping finally paying off."

"Oh, yeah," she said. "It really strengthens your thighs." She whapped Harry over the head with his book, then turned back to her desk.

"You know," Harry called after her, "I moved here to get away from my sisters beating up on me all the time. Not to find new ones."

Roxanne shrugged expansively. "Sounds like that's your problem, pal."

* * *

Clearance was a cheap formality obtained from a powerless city government left to fend for itself and its citizens, if it dared. She called. Megamind may have taken Metro City; the government may have surrendered to him. The law remained.

The intern returned. "All right, thanks for holding. You're all set. I can fax this to you, if you want."

Roxanne straightened. "Thank you, that would be great. My fax number is two three one—"

"Three one three," murmured the intern. She repeated each digit back to Roxanne, then with satisfaction reported, "Okay, it's on the way."

"Thanks. I really appreciate you doing this on such short notice." Roxanne eyed the fax machine, silent as it waited.

"No, actually," said the intern ruefully, "thank you. I think you're the first person who's called all day."

The fax machine beeped twice, its alert for an open line.

"Ah!" said Roxanne. "That must be it now. Thanks again."

"Sure, no problem. Have a great day, Miss Ritchi!"

The phone clicked loudly in her ear. Roxanne set it back on its stand. She folded her arms on her desk and leaned forward into the cradle they made, waiting and thinking as the fax machine hummed and got to work. It spat out a sheet of paper, just a paragraph and the mayor's signature stamped below.

Roxanne tossed Harry's contacts book aside and drew her own out from the clutter on her desk. Small, brightly colored post-it strips stuck out from the book at odd angles. She flipped to a yellow one near the front and picked up the phone again.

The line rang once, twice, thrice, again. She closed her book and laid her hand flat upon it. Static blew ragged in her ear, then the line cleared and connected.

"Is it, is it recording?" he said, his voice muffled. Roxanne sank back against her chair.

"Greetings, mindless slave of Metrocity," said Megamind. He'd that way of speaking that brought to mind long sneers and a Yooper girl she'd once known who affected a posh London accent. "You've reached the office of your own sinister and supernaturally gorgeous evil overlord, Megamind. Between ruling this once fair city with an iron fist and rendering your pitiful, boring life meaningless, I don't have much time to answer the phone. Leave any wailing and begging for mercy—"

She hung up. Roxanne rocked once in her chair and tapped her fingernails against the contacts book. When Bernard had turned, beaming, to her she had told him she'd need time to train before confronting Megamind. She needed a plan. She needed to think this through, to figure out what to do and where to start. Roxanne drummed her fingers.

"This is probably a bad idea," she muttered.

Dropping her emptied coffee cup in the trash and snagging Harry's book, she stood. She checked her watch as she dodged an intern. Eleven-thirty—close enough to take a lunch.

Harry spotted her this time. He lifted his fingers from the keyboard in a small half-wave.

"Thanks for the loan, Harry."

She pitched him the book and he caught it, flat against his chest. Harry tossed it onto his desk. He pursed his lips.

"I know that look. Who're you flushing out now?"

Roxanne feigned apathy. "Oh, I'm just following a lead."

"Well, have fun," he said.

"Believe me," she said, "that's the last thing I'm thinking about."

She snagged her bag and her cell phone from her desk, then she passed out of the station and into the early afternoon.


End file.
